


waiting on the light of day

by zozo



Category: Oxenfree
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/F, Secret Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-01
Updated: 2018-04-01
Packaged: 2019-04-16 20:47:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14173083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zozo/pseuds/zozo
Summary: They don't talk about it. Ever. It just happens, and keeps happening.





	waiting on the light of day

They don’t talk about it. Ever. It just happens, and keeps happening.

The first time, they were studying together in Clarissa’s bedroom, propped up shoulder-to-shoulder on a massive nest of pillows, Nona crafting some kind of slideshow on her laptop, Clarissa vengefully slashing a highlighter through her copy of King Lear. Apropos of nothing Clarissa could discern, Nona closed the lid of her MacBook, gently reached over to touch Clarissa’s chin, and turned her head towards a soft, warm kiss. Clarissa’s mind was a tangle of overlapping, simultaneous thoughts— _this is much better than studying_ and _wait, what the fuck?_ and _I don’t want to drop my highlighter on the bed_ and _oh, okay, finally_ —and they made out until Nona had to go home.

Clarissa wasn’t expecting Nona to, like, _ask her out_ or anything, but she thought maybe at least they’d text about it. She was pretty sure she’d go crazy if they didn’t. But then the conversation never materialized, and neither did Clarissa’s anxiety, and the next time Nona reached for her (in the middle of a Netflix marathon) the only thing she thought was _ah, this is what it’s going to be like_.

***

She’s pacing circles around Nona’s bedroom, hands grasping at nothing like she’s trying to conjure a cigarette from thin air. Nona’s sitting cross-legged on her bed, brows furrowed with concern. “I don’t even want to go now.”

“Clarissa, are you serious? It’s tradition. It’s gonna be fun.”

“Ren is bringing Alex.”

“So?” Clarissa knows Nona knows the answer. She knows Nona’s just trying to make her say it out loud, name her problem so she can address it directly instead of through a thousand passive-aggressive comments. She usually falls for Nona’s therapist shit, usually ends up feeling better for it, but not today.

“So he’s bringing _Alex_. Alex is going to be there. At the party. So, fuck the party.”

“Come _on_ , Clarissa. It’ll be fine. There’ll be loads of people there, we can just ignore her.”

“I don’t want to even _see_ her. I don’t want to think about—can’t I just have one night where I don’t—”

“She has bright blue hair, for god’s sake. It’s not going to be hard to avoid her.”

“I don’t want to _have_ to avoid her!”

Surely this is it. Surely she’s dug her heels in too deep this time; surely Nona’s had enough of her attitude, her obstinant refusal to feel even a little bit better about Michael, about anything. Nona’s frown deepens and she climbs off the bed to stand in front of Clarissa, interrupting her latest circuit of the room. This is when the shouting starts, Clarissa thinks.

Instead, Nona gets way up on her tiptoes and kisses Clarissa very softly on the lips, and then a little less softly, and then her hands are on Clarissa’s waist and her mouth opens a little and she tastes like the chocolate-covered pretzels they’ve been snacking on and Clarissa is so, so tempted to drop the subject of the party altogether and just…

She pulls back. Nona looks confused, and the front of Clarissa’s body feels cold as she takes a step away, and she knows she’s being reckless with this, whatever it is between them, but she says it anyway, the first thing she’s ever said about… this.

“Is this supposed to make me feel better? Or just shut me up?”

Pain flashes across Nona’s face for a second, but she smooths it over with determination. Clarissa feels like a monster. “No, of course not. But it’s something to do besides fall down a vortex of thinking about how shitty you feel. And maybe it could be a reminder that you’re not alone in this, if you weren’t so dedicated to being a self-centred _asshole_.”

Nona sounds frustrated, but not angry, and when Clarissa meets her eyes, they’re almost pleading. Guilt roils in her stomach. She really _is_ being an asshole.

“Nona, I—fuck. I’m sorry. What a shitty thing to say.”

“Yeah. It was. Now listen. As bad as it’s gonna feel to see Alex at the party, I guarantee you you’re going to feel worse sitting at home obsessing about it. You’ll have alcohol, you’ll have plenty of other people to talk to…” Nona tilts her head down bashfully and it does something indescribable to the inside of Clarissa’s chest. “You’ll have me.”

Clarissa can’t argue with that, and doesn’t. She kisses Nona instead, trying to convey every ounce of contrition she feels, and the little groan of pleasure and/or vindication Nona makes does indeed wipe all thoughts of Alex from Clarissa’s mind.

***

Sometimes Clarissa can’t believe the things that come out of her mouth. She _knows_ Ren likes Nona, he can’t stop drooling over her, _why_ does she want to hear him say it with his own stupid mouth? Truth or Slap is supposed to be about literally slapping other people in the literal face, not metaphorically kicking her own heart in the metaphorical dick. Ren dodges the question like the total fuckboy he is, and before anything even worse can come flying out of Clarissa’s masochistic id, _Alex_ of all people calls him out, and slaps him so hard her new stepbrother cringes.

 _Maybe_ , her traitorous mind thinks, _this won’t be so bad_. Then it’s Alex’s turn to ask her a question, and the little shit throws a curveball that nearly knocks Clarissa’s breath out: “Who’s the last person you made out with?” The last person Clarissa made out with is sitting a foot to her left, holding a red Solo cup of god-knows-what to her lips and staring into the fire with a casualness Clarissa can tell is fake as hell.

So she punts. Bets the farm on Nona being both a better friend to her than Alex is to Ren, and self-interested enough not to open up their… whatever-it-is… to the Beacon Beach peanut gallery. It feels like the safest bet she can make. Talks about what’s-his-name at whatever party, and Nona plays along with a brief bite of her lower lip and a flash of eye contact that fills Clarissa’s mind with memories of Nona’s hands sliding up her shirt—and then Alex’s eye catches hers with a look in it like pity, and in the light of the fire the shadow of her jaw makes her look so much like Michael, and the anxious nausea in Clarissa’s stomach inverts into a mix of pleasure and dread, and the pleasure feels like a betrayal and the dread feels like weakness, and suddenly everything is way too fucking complicated. She wants everyone to fuck off, so she says the worst things she can think of until they do.

And then they do fuck off, everyone but Nona, and Clarissa forces small talk until the rest of them are over the fence and out of earshot.

“So that was… a lot.” Nona isn’t looking at her. She’s trailing her fingers casually through the sand. Clarissa ducks her head.

“Yeah. Sorry.”

Nona shoulder-bumps her. “You know Alex’s mom didn’t get remarried specifically to fuck up your life, right?” From anyone else, it would sound condescending at best, if not outright cruel. But there’s a tenderness under the wry edge in Nona’s voice, and if it doesn’t completely blunt the impact—well, Clarissa’s pretty sure she deserves it.

“I know. I just— _god_.”

“And you know that even if I did like Ren, which I’m pretty sure I don’t, you’re still the main person I want to have whiskey-and-ice-cream sleepovers with, okay? I don’t always know _why_ , but you are, so try to chill a little, okay?”

Clarissa feels chastised, but forgiven, and when Nona kisses her on the nose, she feels brave enough to return the kiss at the corner of the other girl’s mouth. Nona’s eyes flicker towards the fence, but the ghostbusters must be long gone, because she laughs into Clarissa’s next kiss and pulls her down on the blanket they brought.

***

Something is wrong. Something is very, very wrong.

They’re back at the bonfire, playing Truth or Slap. It’s Alex’s turn, and she turns to Clarissa to ask her question. The light from the flames flickers blue along her jaw, and she looks nothing like Michael at all.

But they’re not on the beach. They’re at Fort Milner, outside the building where Clarissa found the radio, where she waited for hours for Alex and Jonas, where… everything went fuzzy for a while after. Nobody else seems to notice. Jonas walks over to the cooler to grab another drink.

“W-what,” Clarissa croaks, like it’s been a thousand years since she’s had a glass of water, “what’s happening now?”

“It’s Alex’s turn to ask a question,” Ren says, in a tone of voice like he thinks he’s being helpful.

“Let’s just get this over with,” Nona murmurs in her ear, but when Clarissa turns to look, the other girl is twenty feet away, on the other side of the fire.

“That’s right,” Alex says, with an unusual pulse of confidence in her voice. “It’s my turn to ask, and Clarissa should know what my question is going to be, because she’s had it coming for a year now.

“Clarissa. How _dare_ you?”

This isn’t real. This can’t be real.

Jonas says something: “Alex, that’s not—” and Clarissa turns to look at him. He’s standing next to Alex, whose face is still eerie with cold blue light, but his face is completely in shadow. She can barely even make out his nose.

“She knows exactly what I mean,” Alex snaps. “How _dare_ you? How dare you act like you’re _grieving_ Michael? I lost my _brother_! I lost part of my _family_! You dated him for like _five seconds_. You should get the _fuck_ over it already.”

This isn’t happening. It’s a hallucination, probably. This can’t even be time travel, they never had a bonfire at the fort. And Alex… Alex would never be this cruel. Not the real Alex. Not even to her.

Now Ren pipes up. Clarissa doesn’t even want to look at him. “Alex, I’m glad you’re getting all this off your chest, but now is really not the time. We’ve got to find a way off this island.”

“No,” says Alex. Ren sputters. Clarissa stares into the white heart of the fire and wonders if she’s losing her mind.

“What do you mean, ‘no’? We—”

Clarissa looks up just in time to see blood-red light start to spill from Alex’s eyes and, when she opens it to speak, her mouth. **Alle, alle, auch sind frei,** Alex says, in a voice that sounds nothing like human at all.

 _This isn’t happening,_ Clarissa thinks, frantically searching for Nona as the world dissolves to static, _but it’s real anyway._

***

She wakes up choking on seawater that isn’t actually filling her lungs. Two sets of arms, one on each side, prop her gently against the railing of the ferry, but nothing comes up. Of course it doesn’t. It’s not like she drowned.

Clarissa tries to open her eyes, but the early morning sunlight ( _what? how?_ ) is too much, so she closes them again. The warm, heavy body on her left side smells like cigarettes, so that must be Jonas; the one on her right smells like damp wool and sweaty girl, and she collapses into Nona with a relief that feels almost obscene. Nona makes a little “eep!” but shifts to take her weight, and guides them both slowly back to a bench seat.

“What… happened?” Her voice sounds wrong. Too low, and kind of… muffled? It takes her a second to realize that’s just what it sounds like from inside her head.

Nona still has an arm around her; Clarissa feels her shrug. Jonas sighs. Maybe he’s shrugging too. “I don’t even know,” he says. “We went into the cave, there was some spooky ghost shit, and the next thing I knew, we were waking up on the beach. Well, Nona woke up first, and woke me up. You and Ren and Alex were out cold.”

“Alex still is,” Nona says softly, “but we think she’s okay. And I think Ren’s just asleep.”

“Hey! I’m awake, you jerks. I’m just exhausted.”

“Whatever,” Nona says to him, not unkindly, and brings her other arm around Clarissa to squeeze her tight. Melting into Nona’s embrace would be terrible for her tough-bitch image, Clarissa reflects, and she’s still too muddle-headed to figure out how much intimacy in front of their friends is supposed to be too much… _But fuck it_ , she thinks, _we almost died_ , and snuggles in close.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from ["Half Life" by Oh Pep!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3apvwMIdLIA)


End file.
